Resolution
by mimma
Summary: AU where Tsuna is a girl and went to Italy as a child. Possibly dark.
1. Chapter 1

Iemitsu's daughter comes to Italy when she is eleven. The ninth has had a bad spell with his heart and Xanxus's inheritance seems closer than ever. The Outside Adviser wants his daughter close to him in this time of danger- and though no one mentions it, she's also there as a comfort to the old man in his dying years.

If Xanxus permitted himself to be impressed by anything, he would have been by Sawada Iemitsu- but his daughter is a weak, wispy thing, more eight than eleven, a mouse in a house of lions.

_This_, this girl, also carries the blood of the Vongola in her veins, like he does. But they couldn't be more different, Xanxus fifteen and lordly, killings and a kingdom to his name. Xanxus is learning how to run the family and plotting to usurp his cousins, because although he is the heir-apparent, that's not the same as a heir. He has no time for another distant cousin, some civilian girl who has no idea of the life she's leading and her face always hidden behind her hair and behind her father.

Things being as they are, this changes.

Some of his cousins' supporters ambush Xanxus in a quiet corner at someone else's house during some dinner, where weapons are not permitted but there are, apparently, imbeciles allowed. Even without his guns Xanxus can handle them all easily, though he's careful with the flame- no one can be allowed to see him struggling. His reputation must remain impeachable.

Caution bites him in the ass. The little girl wanders into the room, clearly intent on hiding from everybody and the world. She freezes upon seeing them, her mouth a wide round O of surprise. One of the assailants is still enough on top of things that he immediately lunges for her, holding a knife to her throat.

"Ha," he pants. "Give up, or Iemitsu's daughter has her pretty little throat cut."

Before Xanxus can point out that he could care less about a girl he barely knows, one of her wildly flailing little fists smashes into the man's face with the strength of desperation, and her shiny shoes dig into his stomach. The man curses and drops her, which is just enough time for Xanxus to cross the room and break his stupid trash neck.

With that done, he finishes the rest of them easily. Iemitsu's daughter- her name is Natsuki or Natsumi or some other weird Japanese name, stares at him, eyes large and liquid and- cold. It's the first indication that this girl is anything other than a whimpering, useless crybaby- or maybe it's just Xanxus's blood speaking, the thrill of absolute victory and absolute perception.

Then they scrunch up and fill up and the girl throws herself at Xanxus's leg, sobbing and screaming with fear. Awkwardly, he pokes at her, so much smaller and more breakable than

him, crying and clinging to _him_.

(If pressed, later, Natsu recalls it like this: he saved me.

Xanxus saw and thought: she saved herself.)

Because he refuses to walk around with semi-hysterical girl attached to his leg, Xanxus coaxes her up into his arms, and halts her noisy shrieks with "Stop that. It's weak."

_Weak_, and she had lifted impossibly long lashes wet with tears to stare at him. "He was-" she chokes out to him, in her own language, sure, so sure, that this is another one who will not understand her, like everyone else in this confusing, terrifying country, where her daddy has to do shadowy work everyday and her mummy is in Japan, so far away. It barely registers that he has addressed her in Japanese. "He was going to hurt me."

"Kill you," corrects Xanxus. "He didn't," and here Xanxus smiles, or what passes for a smile with him, all savage pleasure and grim humor mixed with self-assurance. "because you hurt him first."

"Did you," whispers Natsu, looking at him like a god. Xanxus glorifies in that look. _This_ is how people should look at him.

"Trash like that doesn't deserve to live."

And then they are back in the main hall, with plenty of people to exclaim over their state of disarray and more to cast disapproving looks at his cousins' innocent disclaimers over Xanxus's almost completely fabricated story, but all the while, Natsu keeps staring at Xanxus, and he cannot help but feel the weight of her regard.

.0.

Natsumi (he refuses to call her Natsu, or even worse, Natsu-chan, she is childish and childlike enough already) develops an enormous hero-worshipping crush on Xanxus. She calls him onii-sama, waits on him, spends her time dangling around him and seems entirely willing to shape herself to his preference.

Even more mystifying than why she's doing this is why Xanxus allows it.

Oen would think the standoffish, arrogant heir-apparent to the Vongola would have no time or patience for his distant cousin, but the way that he tolerates- and, indeed, almost indulges- her is most uncharacteristic. He keeps Spartan track of her studies, and barks at her to sit up straight and watch herself and all those other things, taking unwarranted interest in her.

Maybe he is trying to ingratiate himself with the outside adviser, suggests one school of thought. Actually, suggest all the schools of thought. (As one unwise but imaginative punter put it: we would bet on him dying by heart attack- all that rage, dontcherknow- but that would assume that he had a heart)

(Maybe it is because of the way she looks at him, and expects absolutely nothing, to her he is utterly perfect and supreme.

Maybe he is tired and disgusted with the conniving 'bombshells' who wouldn't spare a sneer for the ninth's bastard son but fall all over themselves to flatter the next Vongola boss.

Maybe, maybe, because she's utterly different from anything and everything Xanxus knows, like a shaft of light and sunshine in their world of secrets and shadows.)

Mostly it's because she's the one thing he can and will call entirely his. It's intoxicating, to know that you are master of something, given unreservedly and without regrets. So many other things- loyalty, power- he has to work to get.

Xanxus takes care of what is his, because he demands so much of them.

But that doesn't explain this: one day, forcing Natsumi to talk in pitch-perfect Italian, she asks, blushingly, in halting musical tones, taken verbatim from a phrasebook, _what is your marital status?_

Xanxus has not seen this coming, and he wonders that he didn't- just because she looks like she's eight doesn't mean she is, of course. And it's natural that she would like him- he is, he knows, with a touch of vanity, very attractive.

He leaves Natsu to stammer and blush while he examines her, and the traces of woman in the growing girl. She is, he supposes, very cute, when she's not being shy or stupid, and has the potential to become quite good-looking.

More important than that, of course, is that he can do whatever he wants to her. She's his.

It's with this (admittedly little) in mind that he first kisses her, nearly-twelve and nearly-sixteen on the floor of an old study, feeling- feeling poised to take the world.

(There are excuses, at first: she needs to learn, and he has appointed himself the one to teach her, etc. He's doing it for her, he rationalizes. It doesn't excuse why he does it again, and again, kissing a little slip of girl like a lover.

It takes a near-lifetime, after a spectacularly messy affair, for him to admit this: he'd done it for himself.)

.0.

Suddenly, abruptly, Natsu is thrown out of Xanxus's life. He has gone looking deep into private files, digging deep for anything he can use in his struggle for the leadership, but he never expected this.

Suddenly he is scrambling for options, aware that his position is weak, laughably weak, and has always been so. He no longer has time for largesse or anything other than his need for power, and the bitterness festering in him like poison.

Natsu, however, is stubborn and stupid, and keeps after him with her stupid hopeful expression and her usual assurances that his cousins don't stand a chance against him. Unsurprisingly, this only makes him angrier, through no fault of hers.

He plans, and plans, dreaming up a scenario where he can still come out top, all the while hating everyone and everything. Even her. The only thing she does is remind him that he, worthy though he is, has no Vongola blood. An _accident_.

(The other thing she does that he will not admit is remind him that he still wants her to look at him like he's everything. But he is not. _He is not_.)

Xanxus works himself up to nearly fever pitch with rage, over the ninth and his lies and- and everything. He's never needed the rage more.

And Natsu, sweet innocent Natsu, comes to try and calm him, stealing through the halls at night to his room.

"Tell me what's wrong," she begs him, eyes bright. "Let me help you!"

Xanxus's control, always tenuous, snaps. He grabs her arm hard, and throws her, drunk on hate and anger.

"I can think," he snarls at her, holding her down, watching her go fearful of him. "of only one thing a stupid bitch like you can do to help me."

In his defense- and there is very little- he never meant to go that far, only to scare her and drive her away from him at last, only to make her understand that he's not the type of person she thinks he is.

But after he has kissed her harder than he ever has and divested her of clothing, he doesn't stop. He doesn't shout at her and send her back to where she came from, doesn't lift his hand from the bruises he's making on her thin wrists.

Doesn't stop.

.0.

After he's done, rolls away from her, and looks- just looks- at the tear tracks dried on her cheeks, the purpling marks all over her body. The blood. She's asleep, or passed out. She's so _small_.

He's never hated anything more, and it's himself.

He doesn't want to think about it. Can't stand-

Phone. "Boss?" the stupid shark. Time to make good on his promises.

"Tonight," he grinds out. "We attack tonight."

.0.

In the confusion after this, no one really notices Natsu being more quiet than usual, the dark marks on her wrists, her swollen mouth and unsteady gait.

Her father sends her back to Japan posthaste, and advises her to forget about anything bad (he means: the numerous assasins overrunning Uncle's house, she take it to mean: everything.)

And Sawada Natsumi, no-good, shrinking violet, with no one to be strong for and no one to be strong for her, lives weakly.


	2. Chapter 2

Four years to fall out of a block of frozen _failure_. Xanxus doesn't know how or why or who, but he does know what now.

His cousins are all dead, and the only thing anyone has heard about a new heir is that Reborn has been dispatched to Japan.

Squalo has done well enough, for all Xanxus is loath to admit it. The Varia are still strong. Xanxus still has something to work with, with the taste of failure bitter in his mouth. He can still triumph. The leadership is still in reach.

This time he doesn't bother with coups or honor. In and out, smooth as shadows. Shutting his lying bastard of a not-father into the machine that eat away his life, Xanxus feels nothing. Stealing the Vongola rings and dispatching the shark trash after the rest similarly elicits no reaction. He feels cold and dead with rage. There is nothing that he wants more than this now- no room for anything besides bitterness and cold ambition.

Then the stupid trash comes back with fake ring halves and a tall story, Reborn the ultimate hitman and golden boy Dino Cavallone.

And the news that the one carrying the mark of the Tenth boss is a girl not yet grown.

Xanxus knows who it is even before Mammon sneezes out a name. _Natsumi_. How could Iemitsu have put _her_ up for the boss? She's completely unsuited to even live the life, let alone lead it. She's lived a normal life. She's just a normal girl. Even after what he'd done to- no. Xanxus slams the thought away. If she interferes, he'll destroy her. It doesn't matter who it is. No one can be allowed to stand in his way.

"We go to Japan." Because he wants to crush them himself. "Give me all the information you can on this girl."

Levi may be inept, but incompetent he is not. Pictures, stats and extended surveillance, all the way down to the boy she likes and the encourage who worships her.

("Why the _fuck_ would Boss want to know shit like that?" whisper-shrieks Sqaulo.

Levi looks mulish. "He said _all the information_. I got him all the information.")

Grades: terrible. Athletic prowess: terrible. Social Status: terrible until very recently, when some of the most popular boys in her class had to all appearances sworn undying love and eternal devotion. Guy she likes (what the _fucking hell_, Levi): pretty as a girl, bright and smiling and clearly brainless. Something less like Xanxus would have had to actually possess ovaries and tits.

It's been four years lost to him, and nothing makes him feel that as keenly as Natsumi; Levi's source has sent just about a gigabyte of pictures, sharp and candid and nearly voyeuristic. She's taller, fuller, still looking about three years younger than she really is. He'd been right about her looking better as she got older, baby fat melting away to expose sharp bones in a soft face.

(He thinks: _she's beautiful._

The Varia comment: _god, what a scrawny little brat_)

She's still smiling her happy, trusting smile. The stupid expression on her face hasn't changed at all. It's amazing that she can still smile like that, after what- what he's done to her.

It means she hasn't changed either, where it matters. There's no way she can lead the family, and there's no way she can stand up to him.

.0.

The opponents are ragtag _children_. Noisy, unpolished brats with a few playground wins under their belts, and set against the Varia they're worms against gods. Xanxus comes along ostensibly to watch the show, settles himself on a rooftop and sends the dogs out to _hunt_ and kill.

Except for the imposter bitch, he tells them. Her, you bring to me.

Life being thus, they don't need to: a small, afro-haired boy bounces down the street, screaming with laughter. And Sawada Natsumi chases after him with terror and worry written onto her face.

Caught off-guard, Xanxus turns- and their eyes meet, across a few diagonal meters of empty space and ten generations of politics and bloodshed and lies.

It's like he's being frozen again, ice seeping up his veins towards a raging heart. He can't breathe, can't _move_. She's also still, orange light glowing off red tints in her hair and turning eyes empty of everything but surprise to amber.

.0.

Dark silhouette outlined against purple sky, blue gleaming off depthless black. Scars over a familiar face. Face gone blank. But no one else can stand like that, effortlessly elegant and intimidating. She would know him anywhere, and she doesn't know this person at all.

(It's him. It has to be.

_Why?_)

Is he here over the whole rings problem? Will he help her? Where has he been? Wasn't he the one supposed to be the boss?

It's been _four years_. Natsu had almost forgotten that she can never forget.

The weight of the half-ring is still cold against her collarbone. She's not used to wearing jewelry, and can't forget she's wearing it. The boys have taken to wearing them already. How can she drag them into this? She doesn't want to fight. She can't _do_ this. She's never been strong.

Even with (or for) him.

.0.

Depending on whom you ask, Levi has the best or the worst possible timing upon the face of this earth. He arrives in his search for the thunder ring, closely pursued by just about everyone else involved in this farce.

The Varia gather around Xanxus, and the brats around her. Shows of loyalty, solidarity. Then things start to _happen_, and Xanxus feels satisfaction because it's all under his control. Everything is happening according to plan.

Even from that distance, he can see the panic blooming on her face as the ring battles are decided upon; she already knows that there's no possible way she can beat him. Reborn says as much, tiny face unreadable.

All trivialities settled, they turn to leave.

"W-wait!" she cries. "Xanxus! O-onii-sama!"

There was an audible hush. Even the distant hum of the lights seemed to die in the face of the collective entirely silent internal _ONII-SAMA??!!_

Natsu pays this no attention. "You- you- why are you doing this? What- what's going on?"

"Natsu!" snaps Reborn, but she pays him no attention.

"Is-" and she visibly quails under the collective incredulous stares. "Is this about what happened four years ago? They- they wouldn't tell me what happened- just that there was trouble-"

A part of Xanxus is dying to say, _the part where I failed to overthrow the mafia boss who took me in from the gutter, or the part where I raped an eleven-year old girl?_, but it's a very small part, and it's lost in the sea of ambition. Natsumi is _standing in his way_.

"Natsumi," he says, cutting her off mid-babble. She's still so small, dwarfed by the trash around her. And she's still looking at him like she thinks he can make everything right. And he can, just not right for her. "You'll die," he tells her, "for having those rings. You and all that trash."

And that's all there is to it.

(Except it's not. There's the way her eyes widen further, the way her face falls. How she looks around at all her trash friends, looking at _her_ for guidance, realizes that they might die as easily as those men did a lifetime ago.

How she looks back at him, eyes cold with fear, and turns away.)

.0.

Natsu feels like dying. How can she have agreed to this? She knows how strong Xanxus is, has seen Squalo take them all down without batting an eye. How can she have doomed her friends like this?

("I have to go through with this, don't I," she tells Reborn. "Xanxus won't let us go."

"He's that sort of person," Reborn agrees. "How, Natsu?"

"I don't," she whispers, and clenches her fist until it's white. "I don't want my friends to die.")


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

The second fight goes rather well, which is to say: Lambo doesn't die. Sasagawa-sempai hadn't died either. Maybe, just maybe, it will be okay.

But Natsu can't help but stare at the man desperate for the boy's approval, and remember when she was like that, and remember that she's never changed.

Or hasn't she?

In any case, it doesn't matter, because the sky ring is gone. Natsu catches herself missing its weight around her neck, and shakes herself. She's glad it's gone. She doesn't _want_ to be Boss.

But they have to win. They have to win, or die.

Still- stomping on a five-year-old? Even no-good-Natsu can't help but think _so uncool_.

.0.

Even though he's faintly aware of how _incredibly lame_ it is, Xanxus turns up to Levi's battle anyway, not that the trash has the guts to lose.

Natsumi interferes and saves the brat from being killed by Levi, and looks- so different. But it doesn't matter that she can use the flame. It can't stand up to his. Nevertheless…

"Natsumi…" he says, and her trash hangers-on erupt with indignation, which they both ignore. "What's with that look? Don't say that you think you can take the position of boss away from me."

"I never," she says. She's still holding the little brat, face defiant. Fool. "I never _wanted_ to be boss! I- I just- I just don't want my friends to die!"

Anger surges through Xanxus familiar and life-giving as blood. Of course the stupid girl never wanted to be boss, and of course she then got it handed to her on a silver platter. She doesn't deserve it. She doesn't even want it. He should be the one, and yet he isn't. _Isn't._

The cervello bitch barely merits attention. But her fatal intervention checks him. He'll crush them. Make examples. No one will dare ever challenge him again.

He feels a smile stretch his face, and, like the Varia, Natsumi's breath catches because that smile always precedes some vicious victory of his. It can't bode well for her, and it doesn't usually bode well for them.

"You- really haven't changed, Natsumi." He smiles again. Gasp. Shock. Awe. He's never told the Varia about his little 'cousin' (his little pet), and she's clearly never said a word to her 'friends' about the time she lived in Italy. This reference to their history shakes her, as they had both been perfectly happy to pretend it never happened- at least, in front of the peanut gallery. Natsumi turns eyes like headlamps on him, wondering what he's going to say. "You're still so stupid and weak."

Before they can decipher that comment, Xanxus throws another bombshell. "Is this how you act towards someone who saved your life?"

The Varia nearly riot at the idea that Xanxus would ever lift a finger for anyone but himself. The stupid trash _do_ riot over the idea that their precious angel Natsu might ever owe anything to that bastard. Natsumi trembles. He knew perfectly well how she'd felt about him, and why. Their gazes lock. If Natsumi is the girl he knows she is, she'll concentrate on what she owes him- won't consider that it was more than paid with what he did to her four years ago.

"Really?" says an unwelcome voice. "But didn't you say then that she would never have been in danger if it wasn't for you?" Iemitsu. _Now_ he chooses to speak up? Also, one would think the Outside Adviser would be smart enough to have worked out that Xanxus chose to make himself look good against his fucking cousins.

Taunting Iemitsu distracts him from the warmth of the ring, half of which had been fished out of Natsumi's shirt, where she'd worn it against skin. Is it still smooth and- no. The ring. The ring is all that matters.

The next match-up is announced, and Xanxus fires one last parting shot before he turns to go. "I'll destroy everything that's precious to you," he tells her, cold, cruel. And, sweetly, so sweetly it could not have been anything other than poison, "_Natsu-chan_."

.0.

Natsu can't stop trembling. Lambo was _so badly_ injured, and Gokudera-kun is next up against those horrible monsters.

And eventually she'll have to face the most horrible monster of them all. She _knows_ Xanxus, knows his moods and preferences, knows his capabilities. She saw that Cervello woman die with an offhand hit, held Lambo's small body in her arms and felt how close to death he was. But Xanxus saved her, all those years ago, and has he really changed so much that he'll lift his hand against _her_? But- he will. She knows it. If he gets his way, her and all her friends and family will die.

That can't happen. She can't allow that to happen.

_The Vongola have no use for the type of boss who would leave a subordinate to die_.

Natsumi doesn't want to be that type of person either. She's only recently gained these friends, she doesn't want to lose them.

"Reborn," she whispers, and her teacher stops but doesn't look back.

"I…"

"I can't hear you," says Reborn almost idly.

Natsu lifts her head. "I want to become stronger!"

Reborn smiles, soft and secret, and he says, "It's only going to get harder from now."

.0.

Storm battle aftermath, and Xanxus is tense, nerves twanging off the air like too-taut strings. It shouldn't be like this. _He has the ring_, at last, at last. His _real_ birthright is close, even with Lus's humiliating loss to Natsumi's boxer.

Even with the Arcobaleno on her side. (Even with the distant cast of her face topped by the flame and the gloves on her small hands, so unlike her that Xanxus almost wants to laugh.)

It doesn't escape his notice that all of her guardians are men, and he wonders that they will stand to have her above them- weak as she is, and not just because she's a woman. Girl.

Squalo, predictably, brings it up, 'celebrating' the 'retrieval' of the sky ring and the storm ring, drunk on the Varia's dollar and Xanxus's largesse.

"Stupid little bitch," he says, grinning sharply. "Bet she whores around with the lot of them, that's why they're so happy to let a woman be their bo- " CRASH. Xanxus's glass is still full, so there goes the table. And hey, there's always some suck-up to get him another goddamn glass. SMASH.

"VOOOIIII, WHAT THE FUCK-"

Flame. Xanxus narrows his eyes over the glowing hand. "Shut. Up."

"If you don't like to hear us talk while you're drinking, fucking go DRINK SOMEWHERE ELSE, VOOIII!" caterwauls Squalo, and Xanxus does.

.0.

There is such a thing as hate at first sight. It's Rokudo Mukuro bending over Natsumi's hand, holding her gaze and whispering dark promises of takeovers. It's that mist _bastard_ having the audacity to try and warn Xanxus away, like a convict failure has any right at all to speak to him. Or to her.

All the same, Reborn's voice carries over to the Varia contingent when Natsumi still stares at the girl who replaces Mukuro with eyes open as a wound.

"Don't forget what he's done to you."

Natsumi's gaze lifts and fastens on Xanxus's glare, and Xanxus feels it again, that feeling of being frozen alive, burning worse than any fire you can imagine. He rips his eyes from hers. Where is her _hate_, her resolution? Just because he was nice to her a time or two, she thinks he's some nice guy?

Natsumi will never forget what he's going to do to her with the Mosca next to him. Maybe this time she'll even fucking _learn_.

-tbc-


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4

Natsu knows things about Xanxus she's not sure even he knows she knows about him. She knows that even though he doesn't like to appear to superstitious, he considers the tens in his name and birth date part of his destiny too. She knows he'd rather go without than settle for cut-price liquor. She knows what he's like when he's angry, when he's bored or brooding or pleased, and how to deal with him in each of those moods, what to say and what to do. When he's in a good mood he's as generous as convenience allows, but when he's angry it used to be that only she wouldn't duck and cover.

Natsu hadn't known that Uncle was the mafia. She'd thought that he was some company boss, and that Xanxus and their cousins were fighting for eventual control. Foreigners did things differently. She hadn't thought much of their cousins, hard distant men (mob bosses) who'd attack their teenage cousin. She realized now that Xanxus had turned her against them, but even then she still can't think of them well. Natsu won't think badly of the dead.

Natsu is training, training, because even when Hiabri wins tonight (and he will, because he must), it will only have been a very temporary reprieve from slaughter. Reborn doesn't trust Xanxus to let them go, and neither does she.

("He's right," Natsu tells them, after Lambo has been dropped off at the hospital. "Four- four years ago, when I lived in Italy, I stumbled on an assassination attempt. They were attacking him- one of them held a knife to my throat. He- he killed that man. He saved me."

Reborn is silent, and for once, unsmiling.

But Yamamoto and Gokudera are looking at Natsu, her small face twisted with bitterness. "I worshipped him," she says. "From that time til- til- the time I left, he was everything to me.

"He says I haven't changed," she says, laughs. "He hasn't changed, either. We're both still the same."

"So," says Yamamoto cautiously. Gokudera doesn't trust himself to speak. "He's- he's a good guy?"

"No," says Natsu. Reborn snorts. "No, he's not a good guy.")

Xanxus will pull something. Xanxus always has a trick or two up his sleeve.

.0.

The ninth falls out of Gola Mosca like a premature white worm, and Xanxus feels nothing. No triumph, no vindication, no relief or sorrow or joy.

The flame fades from Natsumi's head, and with it the blood from her face. "Uncle!" she screams. "Uncle!" her head whips around, and she shrieks at Xanxus. "You! How could you have done this? He's your _father_, you-"

"What have _I_ done?" inquires Xanxus archly, coldly. Even she takes his side. "The one who dealt the finishing blow, Natsumi…was you."

The implications of this sink in around the battlefield, and mouths drop open with horror and disbelief. He's destroyed the credibility of the Outside Advisor and the new heir in one fell swoop. Now, when he wins the ring battle (as assuredly he must), there will be less than no hope for them. He never meant to allow even a single one of them to live.

The old man stirs. Xanxus has to admire his tenacity, like some fucking cockroach. Almost like Natsumi herself. He says his last words to her and Reborn, bestows a meaningless birthright- it should be his anyway, but dying old men hold no fears for Xanxus.

("You don't like to fight. I know that."

The picture forms in Natsu's mind of the dining room in the Vongola mansion, Xanxus and her and Uncle and Daddy, eating together, in-between listening to Natsu carry on a conversation in Italian. She hadn't been looking at Xanxus, but he had, and Natsu realizes with a jolt that she's forgotten what Xanxus looks like when he smiles without malice or mockery or cruelty beyond repair.)

And Natsumi lifts her eyes like ice to him, hard and cold. Gola Mosca's wreckage casts long orange tongues of flame over the remains of the cloud battlefield. She looks less like the girl he remembers than ever, sad and resolute and- can it be?- beautiful, the crushing weight of vengeance wiping childhood from her face for now. Everyone's staring and Natsumi doesn't care.

"Fight me," she nearly snarls at him, and the force of those words hits him like a slap in the face. "I won't let you be boss, Xanxus. I'll take that ring from you with my own hands."

Ice, ice, rage spilling over and hardening into resolve in Xanxus's heart. She's finally said it. Finally, she's challenging him for the boss position- even her. Everyone, everyone, fucking standing in his way- "I'll _kill_ you," he promises her.

"You were always going to do that," says Natsu, and there's something in her tone that might be despair.

And that's it. That's all. He'll kill her, and her trash friends, and he'll be finished with that stupid little girl he'd picked up on a whim with eyes that might have been ice, finished with the love struck idiot he'd used and thrown away, and most of all finished with the fool who only cared about her friends and not enough about herself.

Finished with Sawada Natsumi, ending this once and for all.

.0.

Natsu plays with fire, and Natsu reaches for ice. What is the zero-point, this technique? Sometimes she feels like there's something about it, some trick she knows and doesn't know. Something she's missing. But Natsu strives towards it almost thinking, for she feels it in her bones.

Uncle has been sent for treatment, and though he'll live, it'll be in pain and sorrow. What happened four years ago, to raise Xanxus's rage against his father? The ninth had loved his son well- too well, perhaps. Why would Xanxus hurt him like that?

And- for the first time in four years, Natsu wonders why he'd hurt her.

She'd gone to his room that night because she'd never met a bad mood she couldn't coax out of him, and- because she'd loved him, with all the devotion and blindness of a lonely little girl.

Now she's not so little and she's not so lonely, but she still doesn't know what to feel about him. He's doen such terrible things. He'll do more if she doesn't stop him. She has to face him tonight.

Natsu still wants it to be okay. She still-

It has to turn out alright. All she can do is believe.

,0.

(Natsumi had liked kissing. She'd liked it when he pulled her onto his lap and she'd press herself to him, kiss back softly or sloppily around the edge of a smile, laughing and happy. He'd taught her how to use her tongue and kiss less like someone with exactly no experience, had found his fingers in her hair and left little marks where she would feel them on the arch of her neck.

He hadn't touched her much beyond that, because she'd been so young and so innocent, something he could leave untouched and savor at his leisure.

Taking her that night had been- had been a stupid mistake. That was all. He'd stolen the joy of having her from himself, because he'd lost control.

Xanxus does not make stupid mistakes, and Xanxus does not. Lose. _Control._

-tbc-


	5. Chapter 5

Side-stories

Side-drabble 1

Gokudera fell in love when he was sixteen, and ready to throw his life away. She was _beautiful_, and strong, and kind and generous and not very bright but that was okay because it made her only more appealing, and she could never, ever, be his.

He was content with that, because he thought that even if she couldn't be his he would always be hers. Always be close to her and serve her, and never, ever touch because the starving man watching the banquet could never, ever look away. (Gokudera was not actually all that bright either.)

Imagine his delight when he found out she spoke Italian, though rustily, as though she had not used it in many years. Something that stupid Yamamoto couldn't share with her.

"Boss, you're so good at this."

"I stayed with Un- ah, the Ninth for a while."

"He taught you?"

"Ah- no," she said, and a shadow passed over her eyes. Gokudera was horrified. How could he? He pried too much, presumed too much familiarity. He stuttered around an apology, but Tenth answered him in Japanese.

"The ninth wasn't the one to teach me," she said, then smiled brightly. "Gokudera-kun, let's go find Lambo and Fuuta, okay?"

They did not converse in Italian again.

Side-drabble 2

The teachers started it. Or, y'know, one teach started it, and the boys picked it up as a joke and then, like, _everyone_ was calling Sawada Natsumi No-good Natsu, and what the hell, even if it is kind of mean, it fits. Bad grades, bad sports, bad attitude.

It isn't like the freaking ice queen _cares_.

And it's not like we never tried to talk to her. Like, some of us knew her, you know? From back before she went to live overseas. Same neighborhood and all. And, when we tried to talk to her, have lunch with us like a _normal_ person when she came back in the middle of the first year of junior high, she just stared at us like we were aliens or something. Didn't say a word. Every time for a week. And, like, whatever. You don't want to deign to talk to us? Fine, bitch. We won't talk to you.

And, yeah, I guess she _is_ kinda cute, if you like that sort of thing- all petite and adorable. Plenty of guys liked her when she first came. But she wouldn't even give them the time of day. If they sent her letters, she just ripped them up and threw them away. Like she couldn't even bear to touch them, much less read them.

I mean, _bitch_. Even if you have a boyfriend or whatever, at least say something, you know? It takes balls to confess.

It's kinda a pity. Cause she was perfectly nice before she went overseas. A little air-headed, but okay.

And whatever happened overseas turned her into a first-class bitch.

(And Natsu puts her head up and casts her eyes down and won't cringe but trembles and remembers, _it's weak to let them see you cry_.)

Side-drabble 3

"Voooiii!" shrieked Squalo, impressed by the Vongola mansion in spite of himself. "Xanxus! Where the-"

"_Silence_," came a girl's voice with the worst accent Squalo has ever heard. She was tiny, with long wavy brown hair and an annoying adorable face, fairly shaking with indignation. She's- asian? And completely out of place. She stood at the top of a grand flight of stairs, and failed pathetically at glaring at Squalo.

"Your pronunciation," said Squalo with dignity, refusing to be cowed even by someone as obviously a mafia princess- of the _Vongola family_, no less- as this. "Is _shit_. Where's Xanxus?"

The look she gave him, pure ice and contempt, might have come from the man himself. "Sleeping. No one is allowed to disturb him." She turned her head in another of Xanxus's mannerisms, muttered something to herself in some foreign language- huffy and garbled to Squalo's ears, the syllables running into each other like rain. It mightbe Japanese, but Squalo's knowledge of Japan, Japanese and sundry may be summed up thusly: they have sword masters.

She puts up a good front, but Squalo's met better, nervousness vibrates up her spine. She might be mimicking Xanxus- and more power to her, emulating the Ninth's son- but she has none of the bone-deep arrogance of privilege that Xanxus exudes like he breathes. Still, it's a pretty good smoke for all that. "Tell him to get the fuck down here. We've got hell to raise."

Bristling, she opened her mouth- and promptly shut it again, as a large hand landed on her head. "Stop your fucking caterwauling," Xanxus snarled by way of greeting. The girl looked like a child beside him, and she looked up at him like one, all adoration and anxiety and a touch of reverence, like a really well-trained dog. "Get the fuck out of my house," he said, "and get one of the drivers."

Squalo strode away with an eyeroll for Xanxus's inability to be even remotely civil. He turned back to fix that girl in his memory- whose daughter must she be?- and Xanxus was kissing that girl.

His hand had slid from the top of her head to pull and hold her to him with his fingers threaded through her hair, and he'd moved a step below her so that their ridiculous height difference was no longer so bad. She'd closed her eyes and leaned in with an expression of bliss.

Squalo got out there like the hounds of hell were on his heels. He forgot the girl soon enough for news of an unbeatable sword school in Japan, but not before he had time to be surprised at something he could not possibly have noticed: Xanxus, rude and careless and indifferent to everything, touching that girl as though she was as fragile and precious as glass.


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter 5

Even on the cusp of victory, in the throes of tortured rage, Xanxus still- as he always will- finds the time to be a pissy little _bitch_.

"What the fuck are you wearing?" he demands, eyes heating over- he won't allow himself to think it, but judging from the way her trash friends are staring, they've never seen that much of her legs either.

Natsumi colors. "I-it's my school uniform, " she says defensively. She pulls at the hem, which only makes things worse.

"You don't wear that uniform to school," says Xanxus without thinking.

"It's supposed to give me room to maneuver and anyway I have short underneath and wait, wait, whaat, how do you know I don't wear this to-"

"Bitch!" Xanxus calls to the Cervello, turning quickly away. "Let's get started already."

.0.

The mafia poisons her friends, and it. Is. _On_.

Natsu sees everything, knows everything. She can count the seconds till the first of her friends must fall. She can read the twitch Xanxus's hands make that means that another blast is forthcoming and she knows what must come next.

She won't be able to take more than one or two of those hits head-on, but she can damn well get out of the way.

And then Xanxus draws. She's seen them before, slung low on his hips within easy reach even in his own house. Natsu has never seen them used before, and now they're going to be used on her. He looses the Varia on her helpless friends, but Natsu has to keep fighting.

Xanxus doesn't let up, and Natsu doesn't let go. Fighting comes easier than ever before. It's easy, so easy, to bury herself into the power and the thrill and forget about those below them. But it isn't forgetfulness. Xanxus could care less, but the cloud ring has fallen. Hibari-san has won. Natsu will not forget about those below her. It's not mercy or charity or weakness. It's trust, and it makes her strong.

_Your friend is gone_, she asks Xanxus inside her head. _And you have driven away all those who would have loved you without question, supported you without fail. Who will you trust now_?

_No one,_ she reads in his rage. _Nothing and no one but bitterness and anger and rage. Love makes you weak, and trust makes you weaker. There is nothing but power, to rage and rage and despair_.

And Natsu sees that all he has is rage, and all she can do is take it away.

.0.

And the ice seeps up his arms like poison, and the dread trickles down his spine like fear.

Xanxus lunges for rage like a lifeline. The ice splinters and he almost goes dizzy with relief, but he can't falter now.

"You're wrong," he shouts at her, screams at her, rages. _You're wrong and you're stupid and bitch you deserve to die!_

_No._ And she touches him gently, gently, pulling the ring from his neck with agony on her face. _But you don't deserve to live_.

Xanxus stares into Natsumi's eyes and the ice won't melt.

.0.

Her hands linger on the old familiar curve of his neck, slide to cup his face with the mercy of an executioner. He's changed so much and hasn't changed at all. "Good-bye," she whispers, and takes one kiss in lieu of the tears she can't cry.

Then she takes the ring away from him, and turns away as her work closes over his head.

It's done and she falls to her knees. Over. At last, it's over. What happened then, and what's happened now- she's done with Xanxus.

Natsumi is on her knees and doesn't cry.

And then the world implodes around her because Squalo is _alive_ and Xanxus is _defrosted_ and _Xanxus is not the ninth's son_.

.0.

He wakes with terror in his eyes and the blood roaring through his veins, imagining he can taste Natsumi on his lips. Then the world reconciles itself, and there is the ring. His ring. Viper, the damnable little mercenary, has come through. It's his at last, at _last_-

It burns. Burns and burns. Blood washes out the taste of everything else, imagined or otherwise, hard and coppery and _common_ in his mouth.

Squalo doesn't shut up, because he never learned how to. Things Xanxus has never told anyone spill out of his trash mouth, secrets and lies.

Natsumi 's face changes. He can see it. Xanxus wants to rip the shock from her face, beat in the revulsion, the disgust sure to follow-

And Natsumi moves faster than she should be able to, puts her arms around him. Presses up against Xanxus and murmurs, "Oh god."

And he breathes. What is she doing- what _the fuck _is she doing, why is she hugging him, he's almost _killed _her and she still- she still. She can still do this.

He's missed the feel of her in his arms. Xanxus scrabbles over her back but his hands are too damaged to pull her away.

"He loved you anyway," she said, pulled away to stare at him with harrowing unworldly eyes of love and peace for everyone. "Even if you weren't his son. Uncle still-"

"Don't give me that!" he shouts. "Don't give me that _shit_ about love. I don't care anything about it! All I wanted was the seat of the tenth boss! What _use_," and he spat the word, looking to hurt her now, again. "What _use_ is love?"

"I love you," she said, and the rawness of it cracked her voice. "I've always loved you, I- you know that. You knew. Xanxus, I-"

"And what good did it do you?" he shouts again. "What _fucking_ good did it do you, I hurt you anyway!" And he's going too far, but what's too far to go? He went too far four years ago, on that night with her. What happened afterwards is nearly a cake walk in comparison. "I raped you, you stupid little bitch! That's what your _love _got you!"

And Natsumi says, "You did." And her hands fisted in his bloody shirt, grip stronger than he would ever have imagined. "You did. But I-" and she falters, lifts teary eyes to his face. "I still love you. Even now. Xanxus- that night, were you in pain? All that time- it must have hurt you so badly. I'm sorry." Her eyes spill over with tears. He used to not care when she cried; he'd thought she'd forgotten how to. But she cries for him.

"You-" he says. Chokes out. "You- what the hell are you sorry for, I was the one who-"

"All that time," she says, "All that time- I only made things worse, didn't I? I never noticed that you'd been hurt so badly. I- I'm so sorry, Xanxus-"

"No," he says. "No. Why are you so _stupid_, bitch? You didn't _do _anything! It wasn't your fault! _I _was the one who-" he chokes in a ragged breath. Something in Xanxus lurches and it drives the ice from his heart, makes him say things he's never even allowed himself to think. "Why do you still care?" he said. "How can you still care? What's wrong with you?"

It feels like the world is listening, and finally he's talking to her.

"I don't _know_," wails Natsumi, and the world goes all sharp and bright and _simple_, more simple than _ambition_, or _rage_. "I don't know why I still care. I just- I just do. I still do. Even after all this."

And it is that simple in the end, to know what he wants. To know what must be done. Xanxus's head droops down at last, and he closes his eyes over Bel's posturing.

"Enough," he says, commands. "It's over." And he looks at Natsumi one last time, burns the image of her in battle and fire and blood on his brain. "We're done."

It's ended, but Xanxus knows this isn't the end of it; in a lot of very tiresome ways, it has only just begun.


	7. Chapter 7

Chapter 6

Title: Resolution

Rating: pg-13  
Pairing: X27  
Summary: AU where Tsuna is a girl and went to Italy as a child. Very AU.

Natsu wakes with Reborn gently nudging her face. With his foot. "Get up, Natsu," he says, squeaky and small and all together too smiley and serious at once.

"Ah," says Natsumi, gets up and dresses wincing at the stiffness of her bones, the pain like a dull ache flaring fresh and sharp with every movement.

It's two days after their 'victory' party. It's the day after Natsumi sends Lancia and Basil off to their own devices. It's the day Dino Cavallone sends the Varia to face mafia justice under armed guard.

It's time for Natsumi to say goodbye.

She shakes off Gokudera and Yamamoto, excusing herself while they're still in school. Reborn, unsurprisingly, is there waiting, sitting in Dino's sitting room serenely.

Dino's house looks like the place she grew up. He isn't here right now, so Romario shows her to the room where the Varia are being held.

You don't need chains to hold men who know they have nowhere else to go. If they even try to escape, they'll be handed straight over to the Vendicare.

"Come to gloat, bitch?" snarls Squalo, and then Natsumi hits him with her best 'fuck off' face- all icy contempt and barely-contained anger at being addressed. She hasn't put this face on since Reborn came into her life- put a bullet through her brain that forced her to admit that she still wanted to live.

Natsumi has lots to live for. It's why she's always willing to die.

Squalo- and, behind him, Levi and Lus- flinch back. The Varia are cloistered on one side of the room, well away from Xanxus. Natsumi walks to him, places her hand on his arm soft and gentle.

"…Natsumi."

"Xanxus."

And Natsumi smiles so sweet and bright, because it's _him_ and she's _missed him_ and she thinks, she thinks, _oh God I love him so much_.

.0.

Natsumi looks so damn happy. Just to see him? She should be glad he's going away, after all he's done to her. She looks so fresh and young in her school uniform, and maybe that would be the life she'd have led if she'd never met him- never gotten mixed up in a world that doesn't deserve her.

Except that she was the one who was born into it. All hail irony, and Xanxus is so, so tired that even that thought fails to stir his rage.

"Why're you here?"

Natsumi shrugs. She moves over to lean on the wall, and her long brown hair just brushes his shoulder as she passes behind him. "They're moving you today. I suppose I'm here to see you off." She hesitates. "Re- Reborn said Uncle was doing better."

Xanxus grunts. Natsumi presses on. "I-I see that Squalo-san is looking better. You- your hands, they should be okay, right? Yamamoto-kun will be glad to know that he's okay, he was really worried after the battle and he's going to be okay too, it's just his eye needs to be covered for a little while and Gokudera-kun was a bit worried although he acts like he isn't and-"

"Stop talking like everything's okay," growls Xanxus.

Natsumi stops, and breathes deeply, exhaling through her nose. "Isn't it?" she says, with a touch of pleading in her voice.

"Is it?" He stares at her. There's no way he'll allow her to back down.

She bites her lip. "No," she admits.

Xanxus breathes. "You!" he barks. "You trash, _get out_."

.0.

"The prince _can't hear_," whined Bel.

"Seriously," snarled Gokudera, "You _shut the fuck up_, or we'll never hear anything."

"Aren't you stupid little brats supposed to be in school?" whisper-shrieked Squalo. If Xanxus hears them, they'll be murdered. They will, dying will breakthrough or no.

Yamamoto laughs. "Hibari's looking for Natsu-chan," he said. "We tried to find her and then we couldn't, so we came here. He might show up at any time, actually, so Natsu-chan had better be careful."

"How could Tenth have deceived us!" cried Gokudera. "She- To see that asshole- He should just go and die after what he's done to her!"

"She stole his birthright from him!" cried Levi.

"He raped her," said Yamamoto. "That's what he said he did, didn't he? Do you really think that that compares?"

The eavesdroppers lose their balance, landing in a heap of knives and dynamite and Varia. Yamamoto has one hand on the bag where he keeps Shigure Kintoki, and a dense tension descends on the would-be eavesdroppers.

"She was his girl," says Squalo suddenly.

"She was what?" says Gokudera. Dangerous Yamamoto is alien to him, and he's relieved to have someone to shout at.

"His girl," said Squalo. "Back then, she used to live in Italy, right?"

"Until she was twelve," said Gokudera. "So what?"

"So where do you think she lived, moron? With the Cavallone? She lived in the Vongola mansion with Xanxus and the Ninth. I saw her there before. I mean them. Together." Squalo drags his mind away from the logical conclusion, and continues, "Didn't realize it was her until just now- she's changed a lot."

"AJAKSF," says Gokudera. Yamamoto counts on his fingers. "So does that mean- she was twelve when he- because-" Gokudera convulses. "I'll fucking _kill him_."

Lus, Squalo and Yamamoto pile on to him to keep him from going through the door. Reborn appears, and kicks Gokudera none-too-gently in the face.

"Hasn't your sister taught you anything?" he said. "Don't interfere in matters of love."

"But he doesn't love her! He can't! He's-"

.0.

"A selfish little shit who couldn't give a damn about anyone else, okay? That's why I hurt you!"

"I know," she said. "I mean, I still like you. But you're kind of a jerk."

"_Give the girl a prize_."

She laughs. "I- I remember, the first time I met you. You saved me. You couldn't have cared less about me, but you saved me. And then after that- you- you were nice to me. For you. I mean- for a while."

Xanxus looks at her. And he says, "I'm sorry."

Natsumi chokes. "What?"

"I- I'm sorry I hurt you. I didn't-" and he stops, because anything he could say would sound like a lie. She reaches out, touches his useless hand.

"Thank you," she says. And she bent over him, presses her face to his for a long moment, breaths intermingling, then stands up.

"I missed you," she said, eyes focused out the window. It's nothing but endless sky. But later, it won't be like this again. There are too many things that clutter the sky.

"…yeah."

But for now even a glimpse is enough.

.0.

And Xanxus realizes; he's never had to look at her back before.

When she says, "I don't want to be the Boss, actually," he laughs and laughs and laughs.

-end-


End file.
